Semiconductor devices are used in a variety of electronic applications, such as personal computers, cell phones, digital cameras, as examples. Dozens or hundreds of integrated circuit (IC) dies are typically manufactured on a single semiconductor wafer. The individual dies are singulated by sawing the integrated circuits along a scribe line. The individual dies are then packaged separately, in multi-chip modules, or in other types of packaging, for example.
The semiconductor industry continues to improve the integration density of various electronic components (e.g., transistors, diodes, resistors, capacitors, etc.) by continual reductions in minimum feature size, which allow more components to be integrated into a given area. These smaller electronic components also require smaller packages that utilize less area than packages of the past, in some applications. One type of smaller packaging for semiconductor devices is wafer level chip-scale packaging (WLCSP), which typically includes a redistribution layer (RDL) that is used to fan out wiring for contact pads of IC dies so that electrical contact can be made on a larger pitch than contact pads of the die.
These smaller ICs and smaller packaged IC dies are often used in handheld devices, such as cellular phones. If the end product that the ICs are used in is dropped by a user, failures in the ICs, and thus also the end products, can occur.
What are needed in the art are more rugged small-scale packages for semiconductor devices.
Corresponding numerals and symbols in the different figures generally refer to corresponding parts unless otherwise indicated. The figures are drawn to clearly illustrate the relevant aspects of the embodiments and are not necessarily drawn to scale.